Can Salah Abdeslam be tried for a crime against humanity?

What if Salah Abdeslam was tried for a crime against humanity and not for a terrorist crime? Arrested in March 2016 in Brussels after several months of running, the only jihadist survivor of the attacks of November 13, 2015, which left 131 dead and nearly 500 wounded, is awaiting trial.

Crime against humanity rather than terrorism

While the trial is about to unfold, Me Samia Maktouf, a lawyer of 23 civil parties, sent a complaint to the Paris prosecutor to requalify the killings claimed by the Islamic State, Daesh, saying they "constitute the largest massacre that took place in France since the Second World War"."An attack on all humanity and the universal values ​​we share", said US President Barack Obama.

All the legal criteria agree

According to the law, such a qualification is applied in case "execution of a concerted plan against a group of civilians as part of a widespread or systematic attack". The Penal Code lists the abuses that may be related to it, such as "willful attack on life" or "persecution of any identifiable group or community on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious or sexist grounds". As many criteria legally gathered in this case, according to Me Maktouf.

Imprescriptible crimes

"Retaining crime against humanity would make the fight more effective by extending the length of time prosecutions can take place"insists the criminal lawyer. In the field of terrorism, the requirement applies after thirty years whereas crimes against humanity remain imprescriptible.

"Among the suspected criminals of Daesh are young men, potentially teenagers, involved in abuses, continues the lawyer. These will one day return to Europe without having to account. It is because the Nazi crimes were imprescriptible that one can judge their perpetrators still today. "

Differentiate the regime applied to terrorists

For the time being, all the attacks committed by Daesh on French soil have been treated as terrorist acts, in accordance with the system put in place in 1986: reinforced repressive arsenal, prosecutions entrusted to the parquet floor of Paris, investigations carried out by the police and the General Directorate of Internal Security (DGSI, Interior Intelligence), Assize Court composed of professional judges … But the debate has stirred the world of the judiciary and lawyers since the wave of attacks in 2015.

Deep differences between the two qualifications

Should we differentiate the regime applied to terrorists? The former public prosecutor of Paris François Molins believes that the two concepts "undeniably have common elements" but also "deep distinctions". Among them, the character "massive and systematic attack". This one could not be retained in the case where an attack committed by Daech would make only one death. For François Molins, "the use of the characterization of a crime against humanity should not be ruled out, but its use must be limited and limited to cases in which it is certainly constituted and always combined with the terrorist qualification."

In this case, both qualifications could be retained. We understand that it is important not to make disappear that of "terrorist crime" to replace it automatically with that of "crime against humanity" and that case by case and analysis of all situations should be favored. However, "we do not forbid it" summarizes the new Prosecutor General of the Court of Cassation.